Director, Biosphere 2

Phase2 Technology; Tucson (AZ); On-site; USD 150,000 - 210,000; Full time

Job summary

University of Arizona's Biosphere 2 seeks an accomplished Director to provide executive, scientific, and strategic leadership for the world’s largest integrated Earth‑systems lab. You will grow the extramural grant portfolio, elevate scientific standing, and drive a new strategy in collaboration with faculty and external partners.

The role holds a tenure‑aligned faculty appointment with teaching, mentoring, and responsibility for long‑term financial and strategic planning, while coordinating

Qualifications

• Terminal degree and international reputation for research leadership.
• Proven ability to secure external funding and manage large, multi‑investigator programs.
• Experience guiding interdisciplinary education, outreach, and partnership activities.

Responsibilities

• Provide executive, scientific, and strategic leadership for Biosphere 2.
• Grow extramural grant funding and elevate scientific standing.
• Lead the development of a new scientific strategy for Biosphere 2.
• Mentor senior leadership and manage organizational resources.
• Oversee facilities, research agenda, and public engagement.

Skills

Leadership

Strategic thinking

Fundraising & partnership development

Cross‑disciplinary collaboration

Policy and communications

Education

Terminal degree in ecology, Earth & environmental sciences, atmospheric sciences, hydrology, geosciences, environmental engineering, systems engineering, data sciences, or related field

Job description

Position Highlights

The Director of Biosphere 2 is a proven global leader who provides executive, scientific, and strategic leadership for the University of Arizona’s Biosphere 2 facility, the world’s largest controlled Earth‑systems science laboratory encompassing integrated biomes including the iconic tropical rainforest, ocean, desert, and savanna. The Director advances Biosphere 2 as a globally recognized center for interdisciplinary research, immersive education, public engagement, and mission‑aligned visitor and retreat experiences in support of the University’s research mission and land‑grant responsibilities.

A central responsibility and focus of the Director will be to grow the extramural grant‑funded portfolio of the Biosphere 2 and to elevate its scientific standing and international reputation. The Director, in consultation with U of A faculty and external national and international leading scientists, will drive the development of a new scientific strategy for the Biosphere 2 that will help meet these goals over the short to mid‑term.

The Director holds a faculty appointment with associated research and teaching responsibilities and exercises broad authority and independent judgment in setting scientific priorities, guiding institutional strategy, cultivating philanthropic and research partnerships, and stewarding Biosphere 2’s financial, human, and physical resources. The Director provides leadership to the Biosphere 2 executive and scientific team, including the Chief Operating Officer and Research Directors.

The Director will hold a tenured or tenure‑eligible faculty appointment in an appropriate academic unit, with corresponding expectations.

Outstanding U of A benefits include health, dental, and vision insurance plans; life insurance and disability programs; paid vacation, sick leave, and holidays; U of A/ASU/NAU tuition reduction for the employee and qualified family members; retirement plans; access to U of A recreation and cultural activities; and more!

Duties & Responsibilities

Scientific Vision, Credibility, and Research Leadership

• Establish and communicate a compelling scientific vision and strategic roadmap that positions Biosphere 2 as a trusted, world‑class platform for rigorous, hypothesis‑driven, and externally validated Earth‑systems research, building on its evolution from experimental curiosity to credible, peer‑reviewed science.
• Lead development of a growing and coherent research portfolio that leverages Biosphere 2’s mesoscale, closed and semi‑closed biomes—including the tropical rainforest—to address critical questions in ecosystem resilience, water and carbon cycling, and environmental futures.
• Maintain an active, externally funded research program aligned with Biosphere 2’s capabilities, publish in high‑impact peer‑reviewed venues, and elevate the scholarly visibility and credibility of Biosphere 2 and the University of Arizona.
• Catalyze large, multi‑investigator, and multi‑institutional research campaigns (e.g., ecosystem‑scale drought and rewetting experiments in the tropical rainforest) that result in significant increases in extramural grant funding from federal, philanthropic, and other sources. These campaigns will fully exploit Biosphere 2’s ability to integrate instrumentation, modelling, and field‑style experimentation at ecosystem scale.
• Foster robust collaborations across U of A colleges and with national and international partners, federal agencies, national laboratories, industry, philanthropy, and nonprofits to secure major grants, shared infrastructure investments, and long‑term research programmes. Leverage the capabilities of this unique facility to create novel research programmes outside the current emphasis and scope of Biosphere 2 that will grow its scale and impact.

Faculty Role, Education, and Talent Development

• Hold a faculty appointment with expectations for a strong research portfolio and contributions to graduate and undergraduate education, including mentoring of students, postdoctoral scholars, and early‑career researchers who use Biosphere 2 as a living laboratory.
• Design and support interdisciplinary educational programmes, field courses, and research experiences that connect campus to Biosphere 2, including intensive research camps in the biomes. This should be done in collaboration with the Office of Research & Partnership’s Museums and External Engagement leadership.
• Build pipelines for talent by partnering with departments and centres to recruit and support faculty whose work can leverage Biosphere 2’s unique infrastructure (e.g., ecology, hydrology, atmospheric sciences, environmental engineering, data science).
• Champion training and participation, integrating community engagement, citizen science, and workforce development into Biosphere 2’s research and education mission. This should be done in collaboration with the Office of Research & Partnership’s Museums and External Engagement leadership.

Visitor Experience, Public Engagement, and Retreat Strategy

• Co‑lead, in partnership with the Museum/Visitor Experience Executive Director and relevant U of A units, a unified strategy for world‑class visitor experiences that integrate storytelling about cutting‑edge research, such as tropical rainforest drought and carbon‑cycle experiments, into tours, exhibits, and digital content.
• Align public programming, exhibitions, and interpretation with active research campaigns, ensuring visitors encounter authentic, up‑to‑date science and understand Biosphere 2’s role in addressing global environmental challenges.
• Elevate and expand Biosphere 2’s retreat and conference facilities as a distinctive venue for scientific workshops, leadership retreats, student programmes, and mission‑aligned external events, integrating the setting and biomes into curated educational and experiential offerings.
• Serve as a visible public ambassador for Biosphere 2, representing the facility to the media, policy makers, community partners, and the broader public, and ensuring messaging reinforces scientific credibility and institutional reputation.
• Use visitor and retreat operations as platforms for learning‑piloting innovative engagement models, gathering data on visitor impacts, and iteratively improving programmes based on evaluation and research insights.

Strategic Partnerships, Philanthropy, and Revenue Innovation

• Partner with University Advancement to cultivate, steward, and grow philanthropic relationships that support research infrastructure, endowed positions, educational programmes, and capital improvements.
• Develop and steward strategic partnerships with foundations, corporations, and governmental and international organisations that align with Biosphere 2’s scientific and public mission.
• Advance diversified, mission‑consistent growing revenue streams—including sponsored research, philanthropic investments, educational programmes, and high‑quality visitor and retreat offerings—to support long‑term financial resilience.
• Ensure that revenue‑generating activities reinforce, rather than dilute, scientific excellence and credibility, using clear principles to balance research access, public access, and facility use.

Organisational, Facilities, and Infrastructure Leadership

• Provide executive leadership for Biosphere 2’s organisational structure, culture, and governance, ensuring an environment of excellence, collaboration, safety, respect, and inclusion across research, operations, visitor services, and retreat functions.
• Lead and mentor the senior leadership team, including the Chief Operating Officer and key research and visitor experience leaders, setting clear expectations, shared priorities, and mechanisms for cross‑functional planning and decision‑making.
• Oversee long‑term facilities and infrastructure strategy so that Biosphere 2’s biomes, laboratories, and retreat/meeting spaces are modern, reliable, and optimised for current and future research campaigns and visitor use, while delegating day‑to‑day operations to the COO.
• Advance data, cyber‑infrastructure, and instrumentation capabilities (e.g., integrated ecosystem monitoring in the biomes) to enable high‑resolution, open, and interoperable datasets that increase the global research value of Biosphere 2.
• Ensure compliance with university, state, and federal requirements, risk management best practices, and environmental and cultural stewardship expectations associated with operating a high‑profile scientific facility and visitor destination.

Minimum Qualifications

• Terminal degree in a relevant field such as ecology, Earth and environmental sciences, atmospheric sciences, hydrology, geosciences, environmental engineering, systems engineering, data/computational sciences, or a closely related discipline.
• Scholarly accomplishments, national or international reputation, and academic credentials sufficient for appointment as a tenured associate or full professor at the University of Arizona.
• Record of externally funded research and scholarship consistent with a mature and internationally recognised programme in areas relevant to Biosphere 2 (e.g., Earth‑systems science, climate and ecosystem dynamics, biogeochemistry, water and carbon cycling, environmental futures, or space‑analog research).
• Demonstrated success leading interdisciplinary and cross‑sector research collaborations, including development of large‑scale proposals, centres, institutes, team‑science campaigns, or other complex multi‑investigator initiatives that leverage shared infrastructure.
• Experience working effectively with faculty, department heads, deans, centres and museum/visitor‑experience directors, and senior university leadership to align facility strategy with institutional priorities.
• Administrative leadership experience that includes strategic planning, personnel supervision, budget oversight, and organisational management in a research‑intensive and/or complex operational environment.
• Demonstrated ability to build trust, foster collaboration, and create value across colleges, disciplines, and organisational boundaries, including integration of research, visitor experience, and retreat/conference activities.
• Demonstrated commitment to faculty leadership, shared governance, and a respectful, inclusive academic and workplace environment.
• Tenure‑track faculty appointment (T/TE) eligible for a tenured associate or full professor position.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience leading or helping shape a research institute, field station, observatory, large laboratory facility, museum/science centre, department, division, or similarly complex academic or scientific enterprise that integrates research and public engagement.
• Demonstrated success translating Earth‑systems or environmental research into sustained external funding, strategic partnerships, public value, and/or policy or societal impact (e.g., climate resilience, water sustainability, ecosystem management).
• Experience aligning facility and research strategy with institutional and campus‑wide priorities in a large public research university, including integration with educational, outreach, and extension missions.
• Demonstrated ability to identify emerging scientific and societal opportunities, organise high‑performing interdisciplinary teams, and move initiatives from concept through design, implementation, evaluation, and impact.
• Experience engaging industry, government, tribal, community, non‑profit, or philanthropic partners in support of environmental science, sustainability, climate, or related research and innovation.
• Knowledge of large‑scale environmental research infrastructure (e.g., mesocosms, long‑term ecological experiments, observatories, or analogous platforms) and the opportunities created by integrated research architectures that connect physical facilities, data systems, and public/educational programmes.